Gaming this Mother's Day weekend

W8taminute · May 11, 2012, 12:26:30 PM

Quote from: Gusington on May 11, 2012, 11:22:26 AM
^Post impressions of Toy Soldiers! I bought it but won't have a chance to play it for a while.

I got the console version of this game a few months ago and completed the first Campaign. I really enjoyed this game a lot. It's addicting and entertaining and the atmosphere and setting is great. Not your average tower defense game here for sure!

The challenge is in the Campaign + where you switch sides and play for the Germans. For some reason I'm not having an easy go through it. I'm played the British campaign through on normal and found that it was challenging enough but not ridiculous. Same difficulty in Campaign + as the Germans and it's proving to be harder.

I lost some interest in the game but recently I've decided to at least try to give it another go and complete the Campaign +.

Gusington · May 11, 2012, 12:30:38 PM

^Thanks W8. What drew me immediately was the WWI setting and also the art style. It will be my first tower defense game.

Bison · May 11, 2012, 02:19:38 PM

I guess I'm going to need to go out and get a mother's day card and it's our anniversary too. Damn I've got a lot to do in 2 days. I need to buy some cards, a gift and figure out a flower solution.

Conflict of Heroes and some Warlock.

Silent Disapproval Robot · May 11, 2012, 02:44:15 PM

Quote from: Shelldrake on May 11, 2012, 09:48:47 AM
Quote from: Silent Disapproval Robot on May 11, 2012, 08:09:55 AM
I bought Alan Wake but I'll be off taking a course all weekend so I likely won't play anything.

SDR, Did you buy from GOG. I am really tempted but would appreciate your early impressions before I pull the trigger.

Yes, I grabbed from GOG.

I've only played the tutorial so far so I don't really have much of an idea about the game yet. The graphics are very, very nice both technically and artistically (except for the lip synching. Maybe it's just my PC, but it seems really off). Voice acting is a little weak compared to other recent "BIG" titles, but not too bad.

The chief game-play mechanic seems to involve the strategic use of light. The tutorial makes it seem that the supernatural baddies that you run into are susceptible to light so you have to make mad dashes across shadowed areas in order to get to a "safe" spot like under a streetlight or you can use your flashlight to weaken them and make them vulnerable to weapons. The trick is that you can only shine your beam on one at a time, so the others might circle around and rip your throat out. Your flashlight also has to be replenished with batteries (must be made in China as a pair of D cells lasts you about 2 minutes).

Often, the "safe" zone's light source isn't working and you have to engage in a mini-game to get it to spark up. So far, the only two I've seen are both sort of rhythm-matching games where you try to time mouse clicks to match your avatar's onscreen actions (such as pulling on a generator start cord or fidgeting with a key in a lock). It reminds me a bit of Indigo Prophecy's control scheme only much easier.

Seems good so far, but it hasn't really grabbed me like some other titles do.

Martok · May 12, 2012, 06:30:22 AM

Quote from: Jarhead0331 on May 11, 2012, 11:33:35 AM
I've got a 5K Saturday morning and then a hospital fundraiser saturday night in NJ at my girl's hospital. So its going to be a tight weekend. But hopefully Sunday I can get some Warlock, Endless Space and maybe some more Cortex Command in!

So I take it you're just not gonna sleep this weekend? :P

Anyway, would love to hear your opinions on Endless Space if/when you get to play. If not now (since an alpha is obviously not always very representative of the final product), then later on, perhaps?

I'm very curious about this one (of course), but am still holding off for the time being...

undercovergeek · May 12, 2012, 06:52:38 AM

theres a 25 min vid on WG in the endless space thread if noones seen it - this is the first time ive seen it in action - looks good

Svend Karlson · May 13, 2012, 04:16:10 AM

Quote from: W8taminute on May 11, 2012, 12:26:30 PM
Quote from: Gusington on May 11, 2012, 11:22:26 AM
^Post impressions of Toy Soldiers! I bought it but won't have a chance to play it for a while.

I got the console version of this game a few months ago and completed the first Campaign. I really enjoyed this game a lot. It's addicting and entertaining and the atmosphere and setting is great. Not your average tower defense game here for sure!

The challenge is in the Campaign + where you switch sides and play for the Germans. For some reason I'm not having an easy go through it. I'm played the British campaign through on normal and found that it was challenging enough but not ridiculous. Same difficulty in Campaign + as the Germans and it's proving to be harder.

I lost some interest in the game but recently I've decided to at least try to give it another go and complete the Campaign +.

Oh sweet! I've just completed the Toy Soldiers (on PC) Campaign and instead of going into Campaign+ went into the first DLC campaign instead, Kaizer's Battle. I'm very happy to learn that I can play as the Germans for a change.

Quote from: Gusington on May 11, 2012, 12:30:38 PM
^Thanks W8. What drew me immediately was the WWI setting and also the art style. It will be my first tower defense game.

After playing a handful and failing to be entertained, I've avoided tower defence games during their growth in popularity the last few years. I find Toy Soldiers very enjoyable though and just right in terms of time and focus needed (not too much of either) for a bit of evening entertainment after work.

I've unfortunately got to work for much of the weekend, but I'll get in a bit of Toy Soldiers, a bit of Conflict of Heroes, and maybe a tiny bit of Speedball 2, which I recently got working on my modern PC thanks to a group which has put out Amiga games as PC executables. Question me on this if interested and I'll send a PM. I won't publicize the source here as I'm ignorant of the legality of it.

spelk · May 13, 2012, 04:58:28 AM

In a weird quirk of fate, I've been playing Demigod this weekend. Never got into the swing of it, when I originally bought it, but have been enjoying exploring the characters recently.

Big mistake to take that interest and install Heroes of Newerth though, first online match, torrents of abuse from a player, simply because it was my first game. The game I joined said 'Newbies welcome'. So I thought I'd be alright. Then as my team starts to lose, hurling of abuse at me, I've "fed" the game to the opposition. I'm worse than an noob, I'm a retard. I should quit now. Uninstall. Dear Lord. I forgot the multiplayer gaming public are a bunch of witless teenagers. I should just stay well clear of them!

Back to Loren then.

Gusington · May 13, 2012, 01:45:51 PM

Svend the Amiga was my first gaming love. Send me a PM if you can with the link for those Amiga games. Thanks!

Huw the Poo · May 13, 2012, 03:25:59 PM

Quote from: spelk on May 13, 2012, 04:58:28 AM
Big mistake to take that interest and install Heroes of Newerth though, first online match, torrents of abuse from a player, simply because it was my first game. The game I joined said 'Newbies welcome'. So I thought I'd be alright. Then as my team starts to lose, hurling of abuse at me, I've "fed" the game to the opposition. I'm worse than an noob, I'm a retard. I should quit now. Uninstall. Dear Lord. I forgot the multiplayer gaming public are a bunch of witless teenagers. I should just stay well clear of them!

Back to Loren then.

I don't play HoN any more for precisely that reason. I absolutely love the game, but there's something about MOBAs that bring out the worst in people. They're bad even compared to the multiplayer scene as a whole.

For what it's worth, I would recommend Rise of Immortals. It's a much, much smaller community and gameplay-wise it's kind of a HoN-lite. However, for whatever reason, the RoI community is infinitely more accepting than that of HoN or LoL. You may as well give it a try since it's free to play.

Arctic Blast · May 13, 2012, 03:37:03 PM

Quote from: spelk on May 13, 2012, 04:58:28 AM
In a weird quirk of fate, I've been playing Demigod this weekend. Never got into the swing of it, when I originally bought it, but have been enjoying exploring the characters recently.

Big mistake to take that interest and install Heroes of Newerth though, first online match, torrents of abuse from a player, simply because it was my first game. The game I joined said 'Newbies welcome'. So I thought I'd be alright. Then as my team starts to lose, hurling of abuse at me, I've "fed" the game to the opposition. I'm worse than an noob, I'm a retard. I should quit now. Uninstall. Dear Lord. I forgot the multiplayer gaming public are a bunch of witless teenagers. I should just stay well clear of them!

Back to Loren then.

HoN and League of Legends are like the pits of Hell of multiplayer gaming. Absolutely dreadful. They make the racist teenagers who pop up from time to time in MP shooters look like a warm and inviting community.

spelk · May 13, 2012, 03:47:44 PM

Yeah I should have known better really. I installed League of Legends though, and have been playing that Co-operative vs AI, in Co-op mode there seems to be a lot less angry teen-tosterone. So I'm happy with that. Dunno what's got me on this kick though. I set out this weekend to play some Napoleonics, and a bit of Conflict of Heroes, and here I am knee deep in Fantasy Defense of the Ancients!

Hartford688 · May 13, 2012, 05:14:03 PM

Amazing. I read this and was intrigued enough to search about. Came across this piece by Jim Rossignol:

http://www.pcgamer.com/review/heroes-of-newerth-review/

Same comments as you gentlemen.

"Nevertheless, the combination of unpleasant individuals in public servers and the overall lack of reward in the game itself means I'm unmotivated to go back and refine my skills. Popular it may be, but I just can't recommend the experience."

Wow. File that under "games I shall never touch".

Huw the Poo · May 14, 2012, 03:15:28 PM

Arctic Blast put it well enough. Everyone's experienced the worst of various multiplayer communities. For a long time I didn't think it could get any worse than online shooters. But absolutely none of it compares to MOBA games. I have absolutely no idea what it is about these games, but it's just insane how much hostility is there.

During my brief flirtation with Heroes of Newerth I even tried sticking to non-ranked games clearly labelled "noobs welcome" or the equivalent. Even there it was just as bad. Everything I did was wrong, apparently. I never picked the right gear for my hero. I never went where I was supposed to go. And on and on.

This actually happened to me: Pick a hero, start a game. Start moving along the top line, only to be called a retard because my particular hero had to go somewhere else. Next game, go that other way and...get called a retard.

It got to the point where right at the very start of each game I'd say on chat: "Right, just tell me where the fuck you want me to be and I'll go there to save arguments, OK?" It's such a shame because the game itself is excellent and I'd play it for months and months if not for the community.

Fetrik · May 15, 2012, 07:26:39 AM

From that i understand the agresiveness comes from playstyle, lenght of average game and how one bad player easily screw the rest of the team. Still, that's no excuse to be an ass in a game labeled "noobs".

The only game of that kind i've played was Demigod. Not sure i ever played it after retail and it was always against the ai.